


Stay

by mycanonnevercame



Category: The Punisher (TV 2017)
Genre: Angst, BAMF Karen Page, Dancing, F/M, Frank Castle is a reporter AU, Hurt/Comfort, Karen Page is the Punisher AU, Karen won’t stop murdering Frank’s leads, Porn with Feelings, Role Reversal, Semi-Public Foreplay, That glow-up though, Undercover Missions, how is that not already a tag?, i wrote a whole backstory for this fic that didn’t make it in sometimes it be like that, it just doesn’t have the same feel as romantic smut ok, making out as a diversionary tactic, romantic smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-17
Updated: 2020-08-17
Packaged: 2021-03-06 01:33:45
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,130
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25945156
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mycanonnevercame/pseuds/mycanonnevercame
Summary: Frank Castle is a reporter, and Karen Page is the Punisher. She keeps killing his leads, so they have to go undercover together. He keeps asking her to stay, but she never does.
Relationships: Frank Castle/Karen Page
Comments: 8
Kudos: 46





	Stay

**Author's Note:**

> I have been working on this fic for nine and a half months!! So glad to finally share it with you all.

She never stays.

Frank ties off the sutures, his hands slowing as he spreads antibiotic cream over the wound on her side, gently smoothing the bandages, drawing out the moment to delay when she’ll be gone again. He doesn’t really know how they got to this point, where she’ll do anything for him except stay, and he’ll do anything for her except let her go.

It’s an impasse, and he knows he’s not going to win the argument tonight. They’ve had it dozens of times over the last year, since she escaped from prison and picked up her one-woman war against the gangs of Hell’s Kitchen right where she’d left off. He starts it again tonight anyway.

“Stay?” He asks, keeping his voice low so she won’t hear the hope, his eyes on his hands so she won’t see the depth of his feelings for her.

“You know I can’t,” she says, pulling out of his grasp to pull her torn and bloodied shirt back on. He can see patches of bruise- and scar-covered skin through the holes, and it makes his own body ache in sympathy.

“You don’t gotta keep doing this to yourself, Karen.” He clenches his hands into fists to keep from reaching for her. “You got them all. Can’t that be enough?”

Her eyes are stark when she turns to look at him. “I didn’t get them all,” she says. “There’s one person left.”

“Karen—“

“I have to go,” she says. “You know how to reach me if you have a lead.”

And she’s gone, leaving his hands empty and cold.

* * *

He doesn’t see her for weeks this time. He doesn’t reach out, and she doesn’t either. When she finally reappears, they’re both working the same case — human trafficking being run out of a local shipping conglomerate — and he’s pissed at her. She keeps killing all his leads, and he’s running out of trails to follow, and his deadline is looming.

She’s standing over the fresh corpse of his latest source, and he throws out his arms in a gesture of profound exasperation. “Again?”

She shrugs. “I was questioning him for you, but he wasn’t cooperating. And then he tried to kill me, so...” She trails off, letting the tableau tell the rest of the story.

“Christ. Did he say anything useful before you killed him?”

She has the grace to look remorseful. “Not really.”

They’re going to have to gain access to the corporation’s headquarters, find some hard evidence so he can finish his story before she puts a more permanent end on things.

“There’s a gala, at the end of the month,” Frank says, even though she won’t like it. “We’ll go incognito — I can get in with my press pass, and bring a plus one.”

“You mean I have to wear a dress,” she says, voice flat.

“You’d look a little out of place in your tactical vest...”

She rolls her eyes, hiding a smile. “Fine. But you have to smuggle a weapon in for me.”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

* * *

He meets her at her shithole of an apartment, and they both blink at each other for a moment in stunned silence when she opens her door.

“You look good,” she says, recovering first and moving aside to let him in, craning her neck to check the hall behind him for any witnesses. He mutters something unintelligible in response, because he’s always known Karen is gorgeous, but he’s never seen her like this.

She’s wearing a long black gown, the satiny fabric hugging her curves and billowing around her ankles, a long slit showing a flash of thigh when she walks. She has on a statement necklace that covers only a small amount of the skin exposed by her low neckline, and he does a double take — it’s made out of a bunch of glittering white skulls. Matching earrings wink at him, partially obscured by the fall of her hair, blonde curls glowing in the lamplight, and he meets her gaze with a sardonic glance.

“Real subtle, Karen.”

“What?” Her feigned innocence is marred by the wicked grin curving her red-painted lips.

“Aren’t you worried you’ll be recognized?”

“Are you kidding? _You_ barely recognize me.”

Not true — he’d recognize her anywhere, even in the dark. He lets it pass, wraps her in her coat and practically drags her down to the car. She complains the whole way there, certain that if they’d just tried harder they could’ve found a way in that didn’t involve her looking ridiculous.

“Trust me, you don’t look ridiculous,” he says before he can stop himself, and she looks at him in surprise. Before she can respond, he’s pulling to a stop in an alley a block and a half away from their destination.

“We’re here,” he says, perhaps unnecessarily gruff, thanking his lucky stars for the timing. There’s so much between them, a morass of swirling emotions and too-intimate conversations — he really shouldn’t add his physical attraction to her to the mix.

* * *

Gaining entry to the gala is almost laughably easy — Frank flashes his press pass, Karen smiles beguilingly, and the security guard waves them through. They spend a little time mingling to be less suspicious.

Frank is unable to hide his surprise when Karen drags him onto the dance floor.

“The Punisher likes to dance?” He murmurs in her ear.

“Karen Page does,” she whispers back, her lips brushing his earlobe.

“You should let her out more often.” He pulls her a little closer as he says it. She smells good, her normal scent of coffee and blood overlaid with a subtly spicy perfume.

“Frank...”

“I want more for you, Karen,” he whispers fiercely in her ear, grateful that she can’t see his face. He changes the subject before she can respond — he knows he’s being a coward, but he doesn’t care. “I think it’s time we made our move.”

When he pulls away slightly to start guiding her in the direction of the stairs, he gets a look at her face. There’s a gravity there, and a lost quality, like she doesn’t quite want to examine her feelings, like maybe she’s afraid of what she’ll find. He slides his hand into hers and pulls her along after him, winding through the crowd on an indirect path toward the stairs.

They sneak away from the party and make their way up to the top floor, to the executive offices — or, more accurately, to the filing cabinets and computers _in_ those offices.

He hands her the weapon he promised her — it’s just a combat knife, easier to explain away if they get caught by security, but it’s better than nothing.

The filing cabinets turn up empty of anything incriminating, so Frank turns to the CEO’s computer, pulling out the flash drive Micro gave him with a preloaded hacking program. He plugs it in and turns the computer on.

“What’s that?” Karen asks over his shoulder.

“Just a little present from a whistleblower I helped a while back.” He makes quick work of the files once he’s in, copying everything that he finds that looks even the slightest bit suspicious. “Here we go — addresses, names, numbers. Dates and dollar amounts. We’ve got everything.”

“Let’s get out of here before I have to stab someone,” Karen says.

“I thought that was your favorite part.” She rolls her eyes as they head back for the stairs.

“Normally, yes, but I don’t want to get blood on this dress.”

They’re in the stairwell on the third floor when they hear a door open and a security guard starts up the stairs below them. He’s a few floors down, and Karen pulls out her knife, but Frank puts his hand on hers.

“There’s only one,” he says.

She gives him a look.

“Maybe we don’t have to kill him,” he suggests. It’s one thing for her to kill mobsters and murderers and rapists, he honestly won’t argue with her about that, but a corporate security guard, right in front of him? That just seems excessive.

“What did you have in mind?” She raises her eyebrows expectantly, and he clears his throat.

“Uh, good question.” He wracks his brain for a distraction that doesn’t involve some probably-innocent rent-a-cop getting murdered, and Karen huffs in irritation and grabs him. She pulls him with her until he’s pressing her into the wall, slips the knife into his jacket pocket, looks him dead in the eye, and kisses him.

His brain short circuits.

_Karen is kissing him_. Thinking the words doesn’t make the situation any less shocking. He freezes for half a second, but then her lips slide across his own and his entire being comes alive with the sensation, their impending discovery completely forgotten. Her tongue slides into his mouth and he growls his approval, pressing closer and sliding a hand into her hair — he’s always wanted to touch it, and it’s as soft and silky as he imagined, slipping through his fingers like water. His other hand slides around her waist, pressing into the bare skin of her lower back, exposed by the low cut of her dress.

Karen digs her fingers into his hair, nails scraping the nape of his neck and sending shivers down his spine. He presses a knee between her thighs, reveling in the way she gasps and rolls her hips into him. It’s a heady sensation, knowing that he’s not alone in his attraction to her, knowing that even in this situation he can make her sound like this. She wraps one long leg around his waist and he strokes a hand up her thigh. His fingers curl around the curve of her ass, and he groans when he finds only bare skin. She sucks his lower lip between her teeth and bites down, not as gentle as she could be, but he growls his approval, slides his other hand up to cup her breast in reward. He can feel her nipple harden at his touch — she’s not wearing a bra, only a thin layer of silk separating them from the skin-on-skin contact they crave, and it’s driving him a little mad, having her so uncovered yet not bare to him.

He lowers his mouth to her neck, tastes the delicate skin of her throat while he rolls her nipple between his fingers, the satin of her dress adding an enticing slickness to the motion, her quiet gasps a symphony in his ears. She slips a hand between them, fingers delicately fumbling with his belt, and he moves his lips back to hers, kissing her with all the pent up emotion he’s never been brave enough to show her before.

“Ahem.”

They both freeze at the sound, eyes flying open as they remember just why all this started in the first place. Frank’s hand slides from Karen’s breast to her waist as his lips leave hers, and he gives her a look, asking her to let him handle this. She bites her lip, humor — and something else — in her eyes as she nods almost imperceptibly, unwrapping her leg from his waist. She shivers as cool air flows between them.

Frank clears his throat and turns around, keeping Karen behind him like he’s trying to protect her honor.

“Excuse me, sir, but you can’t be up here,” the guard says, looking simultaneously exasperated and understanding — and jealous, definitely jealous. Frank gives a shrug, grinning sheepishly.

“Sorry, uh— we’ll just go back to the party,” he says, reaching back for Karen’s hand. They hurry away, make it only a few steps down before Karen’s peals of laughter echo up around them, underlaid by his darker chuckles. For just a moment, it’s like they’re a normal couple, caught making out somewhere they shouldn’t be.

* * *

He takes her home. Not to her shitty apartment, but _home_ — his place. Now that he’s tasted her lips, felt her hands in his hair, he doesn’t know how he’s supposed to let her go.

Only now that he’s got her there and the first thrill of the moment has worn off, he doesn’t really know how to proceed. He wants Karen — god, does he want her — but he wants all of her, not just a single night. He’s afraid to push too hard, for fear she won’t come back this time. So far their relationship has been him pushing for more and hoping she doesn’t leave forever, and if he gets a taste of _everything_ only for her to leave? He’s lost too many people to handle that well.

But it would be worse if he didn’t push at all. It would be worse to always wonder if he could have done more, tried harder. So he steps toward her, swallowing his pride and letting her see everything he’s spent the past year burying beneath their work.

“Stay,” he says, pleading with his eyes, and she hesitates.

“Please,” he adds.

It seems like an eternity before she answers.

“Okay,” she says, her nod a little jerky but her eyes certain. When he kisses her this time, it’s slow and sweet and heavy with the knowledge that they have time. He savors it, draws it out, kisses her so deeply and thoroughly that he forgets everything except this moment, until his world narrows to the slide of Karen’s tongue against his, the shiver under her skin when he runs his fingertips up and down her arms.

He’s so lost in her that when she pulls away he feels it like a physical ache in his chest, but all she does is she smile softly, tugging him toward his bedroom. He stumbles after her, drunk on her kisses, her touch, her existence, and she stops by the bed to slip out of her dress. A groan catches in his throat, because she’s not wearing anything under it, and she stands before him now completely naked. She reaches for his tie as he tugs off his jacket, and between the two of them, he’s quickly standing bare before her. He lets the moment draw out, each of them drinking the other in with lingering glances and light caresses, and he wonders if her heart is beating as hard as his is.

They reach for each other at the same time, coming together in a sweeping kiss. He runs his fingers through her hair, wraps his hands around her rib cage and slides them up, up, until his thumbs are resting just below her breasts. She leans into his hands, almost shimmying a little, urging his grip higher, and he smiles into her mouth.

Instead of giving her what she wants, he shifts his grip suddenly, wrapping his arms around her torso and pulling her to him. He steps back, pivoting to fall backwards onto the bed, laughing as Karen shrieks at the sudden motion. She sprawls over him, and he laughs some more as she glares down at him. He didn’t think he could feel this much joy again, but he’s glad to find that he can, even happier that it’s with Karen. He doesn’t miss the way she has to bite the inside of her mouth to keep from smiling. He doesn’t miss how her eyes are soft and warm on his. He can feel her heart pounding in sync with his own where their chests are pressed together, nothing between them but body heat and love. So much love he could drown in it.

They take their time, kissing languidly and learning each other’s bodies. She hums her pleasure when he swirls his tongue over her nipples, and he growls his approval when she sinks her teeth into his earlobe, just this side of too hard. Her fingers stroke every inch of him, and he puts his mouth on her in turn, licking and sucking until they’re both shaking and gasping against each other.

When he finally slips inside her, it’s all he can do to keep from coming on the spot. He holds still, breathing hard and staring into Karen’s eyes. She smiles, hands cupping his face, and he tips forward until his forehead is resting against hers.

He starts to move, and her hands slide up into his hair, tugging as they find a slow, steady rhythm that makes their skin burn and their breathing ragged. Karen pulls his mouth to hers in a kiss that’s wet and hot and desperate, and he trails fiery kisses down her jaw, scrapes his teeth over her collarbone and grins when she shudders against him.

She presses her leg into his side in wordless appeal and he obliges, rolling them over so she’s spread on top of him again. She sits up slowly, grinding down onto him, before setting a new rhythm. Frank slides his hands up her torso again, this time palming her breasts. Karen throws her head back in pleasure, leaning into his touch, and he’s struck by how beautiful she is in that moment, fierce and alive and _his_.

God, he hopes she’s his.

He slips a hand down between them to press a finger to her clit, rubbing tantalizing circles that make her breath hitch and her walls flutter around him. He’s right on the edge, but he won’t let himself fall without her.

“Frank,” she gasps, her hands gripping his shoulders tight enough to leave marks. She grinds down onto him and he leans up to press a punishing kiss to her open mouth. A few more thrusts and swirls of his thumb and she comes with a cry, and he follows her over the edge with a groan.

They collapse in a tangle, breathing hard. He gathers Karen close, tucking her up against his side and smiling when she nibbles on his neck. He can’t remember the last time he felt this content.

* * *

She stays. Not every night, but a lot of them. He writes his article, and she lets the criminals go to prison this time.They work together more often, and he thinks they make a good team. The cases they take make a difference. He talks her into coming to the support group he attends every week. His friend leads it, and it helps him to be able to talk about his grief, so he talks her into giving it a chance.

She gets him a dog, and is only mildly annoyed when he names it Max. “No imagination,” she mutters, and he pretends not to hear her. He gets her a houseplant and challenges her to keep it alive. The roses remind him of her — beautiful, but with sharp edges. They cook together and argue over their investigations and sometimes he puts on old records and they dance in his living room.

It isn’t perfect. But it’s good.


End file.
